Ahhh you guys! So much stuff has been going on. Mostly I've been preoccupied with some other comics. But this week I shall have progress! I SHALL!
First off, I've been reworking the Rickety Rat board game: A rickety road to the top. Don't want to flesh it out too much, but in a nutshell, I've made it a non-linear board, added helper and crooked helper cards along with skeleton cards, added a class system, and added money and fame tokens. This is definitely an improvement over the former version, and hopefully it will be a lot more fun. I'll work on the art and rules this week and hopefully playtest it with some friends in the next couple of weeks. Expect an extremely rough sketch of the board soon!
On the animation front, I have been working on the stumbles short, mostly just to see how long something like this would take me(answer: not a short amount of time). I'm halfway done with the rough frames and have a number of the assets already finished. I'm hoping to get something into After Effects to show this week.
In script news, I still need to rework some of the kinks. I had an idea for making a funny version and a tragic version with subtle differences, but not all the scenes work in a funny or tragic way. So we'll see how that pans out.
Also seriously thinking retooling the blog design.
Good news Ricketeers! I'm in the process of making my new Boardgame! I give you: It's about the perilous road to stardom and the objective is to take your character all the way from the Rock Bottom Bar to the Tippity Top Theatre before anyone else does! Some things will help you on your way like getting sponsorship and or having a "private meeting" with a director, while other things will impede your path, such as acquiring skeletons in the closet. And if your skeletons get found out, it's back to Rock Bottom, or worse!
The game features the main characters of the Animation as playable pieces: Rickety, Roofie, Dolly, Digby, Rascals, and Stumbles, plus the inclusion of Blusto the Bull and Donna Daisy the waitress making it up to 8 players. The game board comes in multiple pieces that can be switched around to make any number of customizable board combinations. Here are a couple of sample pieces I sketched up: One possibly Combination: The game idea has gotten fairly good reception since I've pitched it to multiple people, so I'm pretty excited. I'm going to make the entire game a free downloadable PDF that people can print out and play, similar to tabletop roleplaying games. I also plan on making a deluxe version which has more game pieces, more board pieces, different versions of the playable characters, and even new game mechanics that aren't necesarily needed for the game, but make it slightly more interesting to play. I'll probably sell it for like five bucksish.
And if you think I'm not working on the animation anymore, you sir are wrong! I'm in the middle of doing character sheets. I did naked versions of the characters first(which was slightly odd) so I could place multiple clothing pieces over them easily. Check out a few: I'm having an interesting time providing textures for al of the characters' clothing. I should have more character sheets next week along with some player pieces and card examples.
Keep your eyes peeled and your ears to the floor Ricketeers!
Hey there Ricketeers! I've finished the animatic! Now I just have to watch it several times and see what needs to be cut or changed. I can't upload the whole thing because a) It's way too big, and b) I really don't want to spoil anything. BUT I can give you a taste of it! Here's a scene at the Rodential Bar and Jazz Club:
And also, here's an alternate version:
I'm still experimenting with camera angles and such. I like the shot of the messenger running up, but I feel it may be unneeded. Thoughts? Thoughts on the story/characters/pace/voices so far?
Also, the music and lounge singer voice was Richard Cheese, who is awesome, and who you can check out here.
Credits: Rickety/Announcer: Lucas Ciarlante Rascals/Stumbles: Sean Faye Digby: Joshua Daniel Donna: Alanna Dukes
Hey there Ricketeers! It's been awhile since I've had a post, but I return bearing progress! I finally finished the animatic of the opening title sequence. Check it out!
This is only a preliminary animatic. I like where it's going, but I already feel it's going too fast. It should probably be at least another minute longer, but for that I'm having my sound guy do it. There's only so many different punches and "ahs" I can take. Although, I do like adding different cartoony sound effects to it and making the audience go, "Pop? What the hell went pop? What are they doing to this poor guy? Was that a frying pan I heard?"
Also, the music is Big Shell West Bristol from the amazing BenCousins at OCremic.org. It's just a placeholder for now until my sound guy comes up with a killer theme, but this is one of my all time favorite Trip Hop songs. Actually, it's the song that turned me on to Trip Hop and bands like Portishead, Massive Attack, and Hooverphonic. Ahhh memories.
I think I'll ace the posters. Not that I won't do them, but maybe one a week. There's too many to catch up on.
So finally I'm bringing back Noir Review! This week, a double helping of Ernest Hemingway's The Killers!
I got a chance to look at both the 1946 and 1964 versions of The Killers and I'm REALLY leading towards the 1946 version. Two hired killers come to town and off some guy, but the guy doesn't run, almost like he's expecting it. The whole movie is the mystery behind why this man was killed and why he was so accepting of it.
In the 1946 version, it opens with a great dramatic score and introduces us to the actual killers as they talk about who they're going to kill in a quaint little diner. These are my two favorite characters in the entire movie, and I was really hoping the entire movie was going to revolve around them planning and murdering the guy. They're menacing and psychotic, the kind of unique characters you don't see in normal life. "What're we gonna do? I'll tell ya. We're gonna kill the Sweed." Sadly, they kill the guy and go off screen after twenty minutes, only to return an hour later for a short (though easily the most dramatic)scene near the end.
The rest of the movie involves an insurance agent tracking down people connected with "The Sweed" and piecing together a tale of a robbery gone wrong. Each character he meets has a little flashback of what happened. They handle this in a great way, not making the flashbacks too long and are careful to make sure the audience only sees what the person flashbacking(is that a word?) sees. It's a nice little noir story with a couple of great characters, a good twisting story, and some nice camera work. I would wholly recommend checking it out. I think I'd give it a solid 32 out of 39.
Then I started to watch the 1964 version. I say started because I honestly couldn't get through the first hour. And no, not because it's in color. Similar to the first movie, the killers off their target, but almost as reluctant heroes they go, "Hmmm, he didn't run. How odd. Perhaps we should investigate this mystery." which seems rather strange to me. What kind of hired killers are these? They do the job, it's an easy job, and they want to find out more? If they were so curious, why didn't they do this before?
So they find a mechanic that's connected to the guy they just offed and ask him what happened. And so begins the real movie, a love story involving race cars. What? Didn't I sign up for a noir? Why is everyone so bright and lovy dovy? The flashback goes on for way too long and the mechanic suffers from "And this part I wasn't there for but I remember it perfectly" syndrome, which I can't stand.
It seems like the noir mystery was just a framing device for the movie they really wanted to make(or the movie they though audiences would really want to see). I just stopped caring. I can't really recommend it for hardcore noir fans.
Hmm. Would anyone want to become an actual Ricketeer if I made an official fan page? I think it would be an interesting promotional idea. Now, how could I make it viral?
This week I'm finishing up the storyboards. Hopefully finally. If I finish them all I'm throwing my self a "Yay me" Party with cake and everything. Then I can finally start on the animatic!
Also, if you've been following me on twitter or the facebook fan page, (which I'm sure you all do) You'll already know that I'm making mock movie posters of all the noir movies I've reviewed. This might take some time, but hopefully I'll get to a point where I'm caught up and with each new movie review comes a new poster! Wouldn't that be something? Anyways, here's what I've got so far:
I really like this one, even better than the original. It just works so well in high contrast. And the best thing about it is since everyone where's gloves, it could be anyone's hand! And in this version, does M stand for mouse?
This one I'm still working on. I think the problem I have with it is that I tried using solid blacks with no value. You can see the original here and a crazy colored version here.
I REALLY like how this one is coming out. I decided to go old-school shading with it, and I think it works out well. I changed the composition from the original a bit to make it work with the characters. I could have put Rickety in the main character seat but I wanted to see Stumbles as a boxer(Didn't Goofy do a boxing cartoon?) and I wanted to bring Blusto back.
The more I do these posters, the more I wish I could make little mock-movies, but alas, I feel that would be WAY too much to put on my plate. Maybe somewhere down the line I'll do it as a promotional tool when most of the animation is complete and I have time again.
No Noir review this week; I'm going to hold off until next week when I'll have most of the posters done. Plus, I haven't seen any new noirs lately.
Hey there Ricketeers! I'm sorry to say, I don't have much for you this week. I haven't had much time to work on any of the promotional materials, animation, concept art, or barely even the storyboards! I've been wrapped up in my other endeavors, the barber comics and other projects with Rocket Powered Dragon. But, Lucas was able to finish sorting through the Rickety Rat audio, so I'm at least hoping to get the opening sequence mock up done by next week!
I do have a little something for you, some outtakes from the recording sessions! I should warn you though, as we're all professionals here, there is some coarse language used when we trip over our lines. Enjoy!
Hey there Ricketeers! It's all about concept art this week! I've got my third tutorial out explaining how to have moving characters with static textures! Take a look!
You can check out the finished product as an animated Gif here.
EDIT: I forgot to mention the rules I go by so you don't think it's all random. Generally, the cleaner and more domesticated the animal, the higher on the scale. So domesticated cats are high class, but wild cats are low-middle class. Most wild animals are considered low class, unless they're somehow exotic. Also, the further you get form mammals, the lower on the pyramid. Insects and reptiles are pretty low class. A wild animal can get higher if he's a smooth talker or just persistent. I didn't base it on the animal kingdom, more like animals + social politics.
It's just a preliminary, and I'm sure I've left out some very important species (if fish wanna be in my town they can learn to breath air like proper Americans!) so there's a chance I'll make a nicer version in flash or illustrator. Perhaps someone would like it as a poster to put on their wall?
I really enjoyed coming up with all the different species and giving them different personalities. If you can't make out the faces you can see them more clearly here:
I've been doing a lot of research on 1920's and 30's clothing(still haven't found a lot of resources for old 1920's buildings. Any thoughts?). It's somewhat complex because I have to convert clothes made for tall slim figures into clothes for short, round figures. I was thinking of just having all the ladies tall and thin, but it's strange, the closer I make them to real humans the more out of place and odd they look.
Also, I found all these cool 1920's cartoon advertisements for women's clothing, so I'll be doing a couple of those sometime. And perhaps a few mock smoking ads. Smoking's the next being thing dontcha know! (Also dying)
And hey, did I tell you about the new Rickety Rat incentive? Well gimme and ear and I will! I started a facebook fan group for Rickety Rat, and I'm doing characters for anyone who gets a bunch of people to join! You can have your own lil' animalian noir avatar! Maybe a bear in a tux? Or a snake in a porkpie? Up to you! Get 10 friends of yours to join the facebook group and I'll ink you your own character! Get 20 friends to join the facebook group OR 10 friends to join the blog, and I'll give him the full on flash treatment! Textures and all! Just send me a message saying who you brought and an email address and I'll send you your cute cartoon character. Wouldn't that be cool to show off to your friends? I'm only going to do 10 of them, so you'd better hurry and get people liking!
This week on Noir Review, I'm talking about Touch of Evil! Directed by Orson Welles and staring Orson Welles, Charlton Heston and Janet Leigh! It's about a small town just bordering Mexico. A car blows up, and Charlton Heston, the good cop, and Orson Welles, the dirty cop, take it upon themselves to figure out who did it. Things escalate when Heston starts accusing Welles of messing with his cases and Welles starts setting Heston up.
Made in 1958, this is one of the last noirs of the classic noir period. And when Noir goes out, it goes out with a bang! Who wouldn't want to see a movie directed by the great Orson Welles and staring Charlton Heston as a hardened cop, Janet Leigh as the blond bombshell wife and Orson Welles as a tired old dirty cop? Being directed by Orson Welles, it has some interesting techniques including the use of big expansive open areas with a camera that pans and tilts to follow a character down the street, minimal use of cutting, use of steady cam, and more realistic dialogue in which characters speak over one another. Because of this and because it's so late in the fifties, it has a different feel than your usual noir.
It has some amazing acting(who doesn't love Heston and Welles? And Leigh is easy on the eyes if you get my drift) and some great film techniques(one I like is keeping the camera set in the room on a couple of characters while another character goes off screen, but they're still talking. You'd think the camera would follow them or cut, but this has a more natural feel) but, I don't know, it still doesn't have that classic noir feel. But still, it's a great film and a nice way to end the noir era. I would recommend picking it up. 42 out of 53. See you next week!
Hey there Ricketeers! This week I have what you've been waiting for (all three of you), the tutorial on how to make those fancy textures! Aaaaaaand it's less than ten minutes! Go me.
I hope this helps guys! Next week I'll show you how to animate characters while the textures stand still. Won't that be nifty? There's still a lot of animation to be figured out, so maybe as I get further along with it, I can do more tutorials. We can learn together! It's like we'll be best pals! And then you can spot me $5.
Unfortunately I don't have any new sketches or pieces of concept art. Although, I did pretty thoroughly figure out the class system, which I'll diagram out next week. And my sound guy is finished on his other projects he was working on and is back on track for dealing with Rickety Rat audio, so hopefully we'll get to see a mock up of the animated opening.
Oh wait! I lied! I do have a sketch to show you:
This is the waitress from the Rodential, a low-class nighclub Rickety works in. She's of bovine descent(because you never call a lady a cow, even if she is one).Her name is Donna Daisy. Donna Daisy, the girl with two names. The waitress with double D's. Man, I really have to stop designing characters or I'll end up falling in love with all of them.
This week on Noir Review, I watched the Fritz Lang's M. It's a German film from 1931, the noir film before there were noir films. It's important to note that Fritz Lang is the director of the great silent sci-fi epic Metropolis, not because M is very science-fictiony, but you can tell it's from just after the silent movie era.
It's about a child murderer loose in a small German town, creating mass suspicion and paranoia. People start suspecting each other of being the heinous criminal. Cops start cracking down hard on everyone, especially the criminal fraternity, which makes them band together and go after the murderer themselves. The criminals are actually more organized, and more effective and can do things and go places the police can't.
It's a great movie for cinematography wise, creating some very unnerving shadowy shots, and the acting is all top notch. The stand out performance is Peter Lorre as the crazed child murderer. It's worth a viewing for the acting alone.
But the problem of this being too close to the silent era is two fold. First it does a great job of setting up this sinister mood, but then it destroys it with a slapstick joke. It's hard to tel sometimes when it's a comedy and when it's serious. Second, there's little to no sound design. There's no music whatsoever and in some parts it's just silent. And I'm not talking about tiptoeing-through-a-library silent, just blank no sound at all silent. There will be cars screeching and people scurrying but no sounds. You can tell where they either couldn't afford to record, or simply thought it was unnecessary. Though, looking back, I was watching the super special awesome redone with extra scenes version, so who's to say those scenes weren't added after the fact. But still, it's weird.
Anyways, I'd give it a 32 out of a 43. It's a great sinister movie with some incredible acting, but it's probably only for the most avid noir buffs.
This week I've been busy with some freelance so I haven't had much time to work on the animation. Though I'm really glad I've forced myself to update each week as it gives me something to shoot for and I don't inadvertently put the animation on hold. I do have an update on my flash tutorial! I was concocting different characters, trying to decide one that has all the details I wanted to talk about.
And I didn't want to do one of the main characters because...well...trade secret damnit!
So I came up with him:
Pigsy Malone! Or Porky McRind. Or Orvell Dashing. I don't know, some quirky pig name. Anyways, Hopefully next week I'll have the first part of my video tutorial: how to use the line tool quickly in Flash.
Check out some of the other guys I was considering:
Ducks and Rabbits and Cats and fancy birds oh my! Of course cats are upperclass. Jerks.
Sooo , since I reviewed a bleah Robert Downy Jr movie last week, for this week on Noir Review I'll talk about Kiss Kiss Bang Bang! Honestly, this is more mystery/whodunit than Noir, but I think there are enough noir elements to call it noir, so I'm making a call. Sooo Noir-suspense-comedy? Yeah that sounds right.
It's funny and witty. Robert Downy Jr. does a great job as the deadpan and silly narrator and Val Kilmer is hilarious as a gay private eye. It makes pokes fun at the genre cliches and has one of those tight narratives that wraps up everything nicely in a bow. I love the dialogue in here. This is one of those movies you'll be quoting when no one knows what you're talking about. I completely recommend it! A solid 64 out of 67. How can you NOT see it with a score like that?!
Oh, and by the way, I learned how to embed video. Go me. Does anyone else love stylish graphic openings?
So this week I have another short animatic for you! If it's too small here, then you can see it HERE. It's Rascals saying one line four different times! I'll be using it as an animation test in the coming weeks.
Also, because of a few people have been badgering me about how to do it, I'll be doing a video tutorial about how to make those nifty looking textures in Flash. I'll be doing at least three of them. One showing how to draw with the line tool quickly in flash, another showing how to make the textures, and then another showing how to use those textures in animation.
And perhaps if I figure out something new and exciting or if someone is wondering how to do something, I'll do more!
Stiiiiiiillllll doing Storyboards. Actually I kinda had a halt because I was working on the title sequence animatic, but I'm gonna have to start back up again if I want to get done before never.
This week I wanna talk about two Noir movies! Double Indemnity and The Singing Detective!
I'll start off with the classic, Double Indemnity. And it is! This is one of the most suspenseful noirs I've watched, especially for a story where the main character practically tells you the end at the beginning! It's about a fed-up wife getting an insurance salesmen to help her kill her husband.
There are so many moments where they almost got caught and your heart just stops. That is how you define suspense. The dialogue is incredible; one of my favorite bits is when the wife and the hapless insurance agent are flirting and comparing the whole thing to speeding tickets. Seriously, THIS is how dialogue is done. Fred MacMurray does a wonderful job as the narrating insurance agent, and Edward G. Robinson steals the show as his ranting raving boss. I completely recommend this to any noir enthusiasts.
And then there's The Singing Detective. It has Robert Downy Jr. as a burn victim who's a famous pulp writer, Mel Gibson as a eccentric doctor, Katie homes as the hot nurse, and Adrien Brody as a thug. It's got fast dialogue, plenty of gratuitous sex, a nurse accidentally "getting off" a burn victim, and on top of all that, song and dance numbers. All of which I had no problem with. What I had trouble was the nonsensical story. There wasn't any real big mystery, no real suspense, and you never had a sense of what was going on. And there were a lot of things that just never got explained, like why he got burned in the first place. Apparently it was based on a BBC series, so I'll have to check that out. It's a quirky movie and definitely not for everyone, but, uhhhhh where else are you going to see a burn victim in a dance number?
So this week I'm still working on the Storyboards and the title sequence animatic. I was hoping to have the title sequence done this week, but some problems arose and it will have to wait until next week (hopefully). Buuuuuut I do have stuff to show this week!
First, if you look to the right, you'll notice I've added an "about" page describing the basic plot of the animation for anyone who started checking out this blog and has no idea what it's for. Plus I added a characters page to tell give you a little insight and backstory on the cast. With pictures!
Second, I did I semi-final version of Wally the Willow! At first I wanted him without a mouth because it made it seem like he was just part of the background rather than a real character(how would you feel if you were just a tree in the background?). But the more I think about it, the more I think a mouth and nose look better on him. What do you think?
I like that he has branches sticking up in the middle as if he were balding.
Third, I'm starting a test animation with Rascals. Rather than start an 11 sec animation with all the other stuff I have to do, then not make the deadline, then not caring about finishing it, again, I'm doing a multiple line animation.
This is what I'm talking about: If anyone saw my Dirk Headstrong animation I was working on last year, you may have caught my video of Squidula saying the same line but having the action being interpreted different ways. If you didn't, you can watch it here!
So there's one line from Rascals that the actor said it multiple times and can be interpreted multiple ways. I love animating these because it shows the different ways someone can act out such a simple line and the range of different emotions one can exude from a reading. Yay acting!
Also, this doesn't have anything to do with the animation, but for those of you know about it, the everyday detective is coming! We did an old fashioned radio play about a detective doing mundane things in dramatic ways. It's been a blast working on it. Right now I'm waiting on my sound guy Lucas to add music and sound. I think anyone interested in noir is really going to enjoy it. And if it gets a good enough reception, I'll have to make more!
So for this week, on Noir Review, I'm going to talk about Roman Polanski's Chinatown with Jack Nicholson. There's two reasons to see it right there! It's a real classic neo-noir. It's about a detective, Jack Nicholson, who gets involved with a big conspiracy with the water system. The cinematography is some of the best you'll see anywhere. If you're an animator, filmmaker, or comic book artist wondering how to make your shots interesting, this is the movie you should see.
Storywise, it starts off slow, and it's a long haul, but the climactic ending is well worth it. Jack nicholson does a great job as a sleazy with a heart of gold detective and pulls off some great tricks every good noir detective in the 1940's without a computer and gps tracking system should know. Overall I'd give it a 19 out of a 21.
Man have I got a bunch of stuff for you! I have stuff up the wazoo! Having stuff up the Wazoo should be considered a serious medical condition for what I've got for you!
First off, I've got brand new all new pictures of the rest of the gang! Rascals, Roofie, Dolly and Digby! I might still tweak the textures and such, but on the whole I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. Check them out!
Rascals in his swanky suit. EDIT: Thanks from Sean letting me know I forgot his whisker Mustache.
Dolly in her classy pokadot dress
Digby I'm still working on the textures. Something strange.
Dolly in her fishnets.I love how they turned out.
And not only that!
I've also got a rough animatic of the first part for the animation, Stumbles' Cartoon, "How to be a Noir Detective" which I might release as a promotional piece to hype the project up. The voices and sound effects are rough, but Lucas, my sound guy is gonna make it sound Beeeeautiful. Also, the music is "Frankie and Johnny" by Bunny Berigan, from the Brick Soundtrack. So even though I think it works pretty well for the mood, I probably definitely can't use it. But I wouldn't want to anyways, because my sound guy Lucas who's done all the music for my previous animations is making an amazing score from scratch! So take that copyright infringement! I think it's coming along pretty nicely.
EDIT: if you wanna see it bigger than two inches by two inches click here.
So this week since I'm using music from the soundtrack and also because it's awesome, I feel I need to talk about Brick. Brick is Noir + high school. You'd think that given so many teen angsty revamps these days it would be a bad idea, but it is truly one of the greatest Noir movies(and movies in general) ever. It's got a great cast of characters that are high school versions of their older noir counterparts, Dialogue seemingly ripped straight from Humphrey Bogart and Robert Mitchum, a haunting mesmerizing score, AMAZING cinematography, and a twisting winding story. The best part are all these little mundane moments you would see in high school life but come off as comical in a noir story. I can't recommend this enough. Check out the trailer and also these awesome character posters I recently found:
Well that's enough for this week. Don't get used to this luxury, I won't always have stuff jammed up my wazoo. I need to sit down sometime!
Greetings! So I changed the page a little and added a cool new banner up top! Huzzah! Although I may change it when I finally vectorize all the main characters.
I finished Storyboarding up to the title sequence, and that part is going to be a little tricky to storyboard, so I'm going to have to plan it out very carefully. But the animatic should be fun. I'm not sure if I should storyboard the entire thing, then make an animatic of the entire thing, or make animatics of parts as I go along. Hmmmm.
Here's my favorite storyboard so far:
The dialogue sounds great! There was a possibility that the digby dialogue was lost forever, but then we found it! Hooray! I wanted to upload some outtakes, but I may have to convert it into a movie first so I can upload it. Hmmmm again.
I may use the characters again for another 11 sec club animation. But only if I can make it work in a funny way. But this one has Bogey in it! How can I resist?!
For this week's film noir movie, I bring you...Film Noir! No really, that's the name of the movie(making it incredible annoying when you have to find it). It's a recent 3d animation from 2007. It's about a guy who wakes up with Amnesia(Obviously) and finds out he may be one of two people, but he doesn't quite know which one he is.
I really like it. From an animation standpoint, It's not all that great. The animations are kind of stilted, the facial expressions aren't the greatest, and all their pieces of paper have "this is a single polygon" syndrome. But the story is twisting and suspenseful and filled with interesting characters, the music is spot on and the voice actors are amazing. In the end, I'd prefer watching a semi-good animation with a great story verses an amazing animation with a sub-par story. This is the website: http://www.filmnoirthemovie.com/ and you can watch it here: http://www.movies-links.tv/movies/film_noir/ honestly, it's the only place I could find it.
Well first of all, I think that these Rickety Rat updates are a little too sporadic. So I've decided that Thursday is now Rickety Rat Update day! Every Thursday a new Update on your favorite noir vermin! So now fans (all two of you) will know when to look for new sketches, animations, sound samples, and general updates! Hooray!
Next, I'm designing a new banner for the blog to make it look prettier and draw in more followers. Take a look so far!
I have to figure out how else I can mess with the graphics of this blog. Maybe make a cool background texture. Who knows! I'm also working on a Rickety Rat poster idea, like those cool classic noir posters they used to have. I have a number of ideas, including an "everyone has a gun" poster, which I thought was kinda funny. Take a look at one of the designs:
Other than that, going through the dialogue and storyboarding. There's some great dialogue here, but it looks like because of interference, we may have to rerecord some lines. Bleah. The Storyboards are coming along nicely, here's one of them:
Roofie and Dolly in Dolly's dressing room
I just wanted to show off the nice design of Roofie's dress. So onward storyboarding!
The title sequence is gonna be tough to storyboard, so I may do something different and just put together something in After Effects, now that I've just learned some AWESOME After Effects tricks from http://www.videocopilot.net/basic/. Yay me.
Alllso, I just watched Born to Kill. It was a pretty cool old noir movie with great acting, alot of suspense, and some interesting characters. The bad guy was a hard headed tough guy and the good guy is a fat kooky detective. I highly recommend watching it for anyone interested in old Noir films. Check out the cool poster!
Hey! That's a cool idea! Since this is a Blog about a Noir animation, maybe I'll recommend a different Noir movie every time also! How does that sound? Does anyone know of some cool old or new Noir movies I should watch?
Here's a version of Stumbles in Flash. I really don't like his shoes, but other than that, I think all the other textures came out pretty well. Though I think his ear get's lost. And I wanna figure out a way to shade so it looks like cross hatching but it's still dynamic. I really hope flash doesn't crash from all these layers. Crap.
So here's my new Stumbles design! I have to say I really like it, from his cow tail, to his mis-matched but semi stylish clothing, to his herbivorish separated eyes. I decided on a mixture of a cow, a dog, and a donkey. Or perhaps just a dog and a donkey. But then he'd be a dogkey or a donkdog? I'd rather the audience wonder just what's in his genes.
Oh and those aren't tiny antlers, they're branches. That's right, Stumbles is so dumb, he literally has wood for brains. :D
So here's a pic of what Blusto would look like in my 11 second animation that I haven't finished yet and have put at the tail end of a very long to-do list. The Gag was that Rickety was a judge for the "little miss Adorable"contest and Blusto wanted to enter, and of course he didn't win. Hence the dialogue.
I thought it was funny and I really wish I had finished it by the deadline, just so I could be done with it. Now, not only do I not have a deadline to finish by, I have little motivation to finish an animation that would take time away from my big huge animation I'm supposed to spend time on, especially with a character that won't even be in it.
Oh well. Perhaps I'll finish it. I'm still working on the look and effects of the animation. I want to mimic some sort of shading effect you'd see in a pencil drawing but with animation, and also get that "cut-out" look without the "cut-out" animation.
Hoooooooly crap that took so long. And I'm not even done. Caarap. But how does it look so far? Still think it needs some polish. Ugh. So. Many. Flash layers.
This is the same ink walk cycle, but over the gray background you can see more clearly the "cutout" look of Rickety. Not sure if it works, if it should be smooth, or if it should be more rough.
Here's a pic of all the characters who will be in the animation! Accept for Blusto. I didn't have any room for him, even though he's one of my favorite characters! Still working on the designs of course, and this was drawn before I revised Rickety.
